08 – Monument Hospital

Tenth straight day in the hospital in Rapid City.  My ankle remains inflamed, infected, and painful. I am scheduled for a clean out surgery. All of the MRIs and the ultrasounds have been reassuring in the sense that the bacteria appear not to have entered into the bones. I receive 9 anti-bacterial infusions a day.  My current projected discharge date is a week from today. Both Sam and Louise Andrews have offered to fly out and drive me to California in my car, currently resting in the Monument Hospital emergency room parking lot. Needless to say, humans plan, the gods bless … or not … and the god’s timelines (and perspective on time and “outcomes”) remain far different than our own. I am, of course, immensely grateful for all of the kindness shown me and for the many lessons that I am learning and that I trust will yet emerge from this experience. That said, in some profound ways the bottom line is about how fundamentally alone I am, even as I experience myself a part of a much larger, perhaps infinite, whole.